Blue Tomato, the international boardsports and lifestyle specialist (blue-tomato.com), is expanding its presence in Sweden and the world. The Austrian company recently opened its third shop in Sweden after Gothenburg and Malmö, in the Mood Shopping Center in the heart of Stockholm. This is the 90th brick-and-mortar from the company that, 10 years ago, mostly sold online.
The new shop in Stockholm is located on the busy Norrlandsgatan shopping street and has a sales area of more than 230 square meters. Shop manager Sean Iredale and his five employees are delighted with the launch. Hanna Joie, Head of Retail Expansion at Blue Tomato: “After a long search, we have found the perfect location in the Mood Shopping Center to strengthen our presence in Scandinavia further. Blue Tomato is a brand deeply rooted in board sports and urban lifestyle, so we are very excited to present our unique product selection to the Stockholm community.”
Focus on building up its retail network
The online shop blue-tomato.com attracts up to 125,000 visitors daily and is available in 14 languages. With over 850 employees and more than 450,000 products, Blue Tomato is one of the world’s largest online retailers in the snowboard, freeski, surf, skateboard and street style sectors.
Since 2012, Blue Tomato has been owned by American company Zumiez. As SGI Europe reported earlier, Zumiez intends to enhance the productivity of its 90 Blue Tomato stores across nine European countries. Still, it admits its strategy was hampered in Q3 by a continuing “difficult cycle” in the market and unfavorable weather that slowed snow-related apparel and hard goods sales.
In Q3, which ended Nov. 3, the global retail group that operates the Zumiez, Blue Tomato and Fast Times banners turned an operating profit of $2.37 million against a loss of $157,000. The net profit was $1.16 million against a year-ago loss of $2.23 million. Gross profit improved 140 basis points year-over-year to 35.2 percent from 33.8 percent.
Blue Tomato was founded in 1988 by former Austrian European snowboarding champion Gerfried Schuller and has greatly expanded its brick-and-mortar retail presence in recent years. The company, headquartered in Schladming, Styria, also has offices in Graz and Vienna and today operates 90 stores in Germany, Austria, Italy, Switzerland, the Netherlands, Belgium, Norway, Sweden and Finland.
